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Abstract

This paper will focus on the interface of school, children, families and mental health support for South Asian immigrant children and adolescents in a Quebec context. South Asian students have often been considered a model minority with strong educational achievement. South Asian culture inherently has both protective factors and dissonances with mainstream culture, which often places a burden of cultural negotiation on children and youth. A few clinical vignettes will outline some of the complexities of the ethical, identity, social and mental health agendas that are vital to a discourse on the school as a factor in these negotiations of children and adolescents.

While the rates of self referral by South Asian families seeking child mental health services remain low, the school as well as social services are often the social institutions promoting mental health intervention. In this context, school staff and counselors may need to build on cultural competencies to deal with increasing culturally diverse school populations. In addition, current South Asian immigrant and refugee populations in schools may have significant pre-immigrant trauma whether from circumstances of poverty, social, domestic or war related causes as demographics of migration are changing. The social realities of Quebec (Bouchard G. et Taylor, C 2008) have also changed as the priorities of language assimilation are promoted to create a cohesive society while the social space seeks to balance an equitable place for minority cultures and influences. Schools are implicated in this socio-psychological dynamic of dealing with increasing immigrant populations from origins outside Europe or North America while they promote both academics and student resilience.